Deer Antler Spray Is Probably A Scam

Red
deer stag (Cervus elaphus) with velvet antlers in Glen Torridon,
Scotland. When the antlers of a deer are still growing they are
covered in a special skin called velvet. They lose and re-grow
their antlers every year.Wikimedia
Commons user Mehmet Karatay

The carnival huckster of yesteryear, selling snake oil and other
strange elixirs, has been replaced by a largely unregulated,
multibillion-dollar market in supplements and herbal remedies.
And the latest dubious substance making the rounds is also making
headlines: deer antler spray.

Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis enters the Super Bowl this
weekend under a cloud of controversy caused by his association
with S.W.A.T.S (Sports With Alternatives to Steroids), a company
that markets deer antler spray and other questionable products
such as "negatively-charged water,"
Sports Illustrated reports.

The company's deer antler spray allegedly contains IGF-1, or
insulin-like growth factor, a
performance-enhancing product banned by the National Football
League and other sports organizations, according to Time.com. Lewis denies having used it,
although some evidence casts doubt on his assertion.

According to the
Baltimore Sun, IGF-1 is approved "to treat a rare form of
dwarfism known as Laron syndrome and in other cases where
children fail to produce or process growth hormone."

One reason deer antler spray has attracted the attention of
professional athletes is because IGF-1 can't be detected in a
urine test, according to
CNBC.com. Only a blood test will reveal the presence of the
hormone. [What
If Doping Were Legal?]

From deer to eternity

But what exactly is deer antler spray? Manufacturers
claim the product is made from the velvetlike tissue that covers
the antlers of male deer, according to the
Daily Telegraph. That antler velvet is ground up into a
powder and sold either as pills or as a spray that users squirt
under their tongues.

The product is widely available from online retailers and other
supplement vendors. Because there is little oversight from the
Food and Drug Administration or other regulators, however, there
is scant assurance that deer antler products actually contain
IGF-1 — or, for that matter, any deer antler.

And even if deer antler spray does contain IGF-1, does the spray
work? Nobody knows for sure.

A small study of questionable merit (it has never been
scientifically reviewed or published in any journal) claims
weightlifters who used the supplement for 10 weeks had some
measurable strength gains when compared with weightlifters who
were given a placebo, CNBC reports.

But other, more credible studies rebut that finding. Researchers
of a 2012 report in the New Zealand Medical
Journal said, "Claims made for velvet antler supplements do
not appear to be based upon rigorous research from human trials,
although for osteoarthritis the findings may have some promise."

And a 2013 review from the Journal of Ethnopharmacology found
that while deer antler base —
a traditional Chinese medicine — may contain some beneficial
compounds, "further safety assessments and clinical trials in
humans need to be performed before it can be integrated into
medicinal practices."

Even marketers have doubts

According to some reports, Lewis may have used deer antler
products to recover from a torn triceps. And Leon Popovitz, an
orthopedic surgeon at New York Bone & Joint Specialists, told
National Geographic that a recent study found IGF-1
supplements could be linked to improving cartilage damage in
joints due to repetitive trauma.

But Dr. Roberto Salvatori, an endocrinologist at Johns Hopkins
Medicine in Baltimore, told the Sun there is no medically valid
way to deliver IGF-1 orally or in a spray. "If there were, a lot
of people would be happy that they don't need to get shots
anymore," Salvatori said. "It's just simply not possible for it
to come from a spray."

Even sellers of deer antler products doubt that the products
could deliver IGF-1. "IGF-1 is very unstable," Dean Nieves of
Florida-based Bio Lab Naturals told the Baltimore Sun. "It could
not exist outside of a very controlled environment." Nieves'
company therefore markets the product as a nutritional
supplement. "It is just packed with nutrients," he said.